


The Paths We Follow

by Silex



Category: Original Work
Genre: Angst, Comes Back Wrong, Fantasy, Gen, Magic, Necromancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-01
Updated: 2019-08-01
Packaged: 2020-07-28 17:47:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,162
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20068045
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Silex/pseuds/Silex
Summary: Samara was happy with Kira, even as the malicious stories about them spread. They merely collected forbidden magic after all, they didn't practice it.





	The Paths We Follow

**Author's Note:**

  * For [anth (antheeia)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/antheeia/gifts).

Kira meant the world to Samara and if asked Samara was sure that her dear friend would have said the same about her. Gods above and below knew that Kira had shown it in countless small ways over the years.

They had been young together, studying arcana in the College of Graygrove back before certain magics were banned. It was a conflict between the High Wizards that had started it, debate about the validity of certain paths of divination and the limits on what could be used to fuel a spell. Their studies hadn’t been affected by the ban, but their outrage over such actions being taken had unified them and as the instructors grew increasingly hidebound the two young women, as young people were wont to do, grew increasingly bold. They never would have found any interest in such dangerous paths if not for seeing all of those old books and scrolls locked away. The allure of the forbidden had been strong and even if they never managed to gain access to the hidden tomes, they had made a vow that they would someday.

After deciding that they had learned what they could from the College they left to explore the world. Traveling was easy and the people were always welcoming. It wasn’t difficult for a traveling mage to get by and if they had wanted to they could have settled down any place they chose.

The place they chose was an abandoned tower in the mountains on the edge of the Briarwild. The building was in remarkably good repair despite having been empty since the end of the last war, when it had been decided to be too costly to maintain so many outposts during a peace that seemed so enduring. A peace that brought with it prosperity and made life comfortable.

It was the comfort that allowed scholarly debates to grow out of hand, spilling out of halls of arcane study and into day to day life, though it took time for the conflict to reach them.

Having made themselves comfortable in their mountain home Samara and Kira had decided to take it upon themselves to save as much magical lore as they could and hide it away in their tower. Some of the tomes they managed to save and hide were clearly dangerous, the rituals they contained horrific, but knowing of them was not harmful in and of itself. In fact the theories they presented, if applied to other sorts of magic, were fascinating. By ignoring them or hiding them away so much potential was lost.

Scrolls describing rituals to call upon the winds and grant fire the semblance of life had inspired Kira to craft wondrous flying constructs. There had been a time when the skies around the castle had been filled with false birds of colorful cloth and paper wrapped around wooden frames.

Samara had loved the sight of those constructs, for Kira had always been more interested in creating beauty from magic than the pursuit of power.

After filling the skies with color Kira had filled the tower with music, guiding the growth of the stunted trees they kept in their garden so that some branches would grow hollow and when cut just so, play high, clear notes as the wind blew across them. The rest of their branches were hung with chimes of wood and glass and metal that Kira painstakingly fashioned and kept dancing with the magics she worked.

Their tower was beautiful and safe and they welcomed others to it. The people from the villages below would often come to ask favors that only a worker of magic could grant and Samara and Kira always helped as best as they were able for the people were kind.

The tamed winds brought clouds heavy with rain when the earth was dry and chased away those same clouds when the fields below needed sun. The beasts of the woods were kept at bay by Samara’s beautifully grown rosedeer. More plant than animal, they were made of living brambles and would drive off anything that threatened the tower or the villages in its shadow.

The two of them had been loved and respected, not feared despite the stories that eventually started to reach them.

It was their continued determination to save magics that they had no interest in practicing themselves that caused trouble. There were those who coveted the knowledge that they had gathered and, though the pair was more than willing to share with any who wished to visit their tower, there were those who felt themselves to be better custodians of the library that the two women had amassed.

Students from the College of Graygrove began to make pilgrimages to the tower so that they might learn from the books kept there on their own, for neither Samara nor Kira claimed to be teachers or attempted to act as such, though Kira would, on her infrequent trips to the villages below, demonstrate simple spells to any who were interested. That was the insufferable slight that set the scholars of the College firmly against them, the thought that magic, even small harmless magic, was fine to be shared with any who had the talent or passion for it.

Wizards from the College began to warn them to stop or show up in person to make demands. They were all ignored and turned away, for the pair was happy with what they were doing and it was all harmless enough.

To repel these unwanted intrusions Kira made the winds of the mountain blow in haunting cries so that anyone seeking to intrude would be unnerved. Those that knew the two of them were undaunted and would press on undeterred.

Samara’s rosedeer grew larger and sprouted antlers that were covered in the most beautiful blooms in spring. Knowing the people of the villages they had grown near, the stags remained loyal protectors, driving away all who were uninvited in the lands. The gentle creatures would still guide lost travelers out of the woods and drive back dangerous beasts that might prey upon the villagers, but in time this extended to bandits as well as animals.

No one complained when several men who’d made a living of robbing travelers were found dead, cut by countless living thorns, but it proved that the deer were capable of being dangerous, their hooves and antlers sharp.

Even Kira’s kites became a defense when necessary, diving from the sky to guide those needing help and harry those looking to cause trouble.

Despite the growing rumors the people in the villages knew Samara and Kira and were thankful for what they did, the little bits of magic that Kira taught them and the protections Samara provided making life so much easier.

Their methods were quite different, but together they taught each other more than the College ever had and they strived to share that knowledge with all who asked.

Of course there was the occasional individual whose reasons for learning the secrets they kept in their tower were less than noble and they both tried to dissuade or guide as was necessary.

Fortunately those who wished to use magic for ill were easy to recognize, often going so far as to state outright their intent, and when that wasn’t so there was always divination to fall back on. Kira had become adept at reading premonitions in dreams and falling leaves over the years and what she saw always provided useful guidance.

Knowing that they were doing good they were able to ignore the rumors and teach those who sought them out. Many times the young people who came to them believed the stories and lies that had been told over the years, that the two of them were practitioners of vile and degenerate paths of magic. Proving them wrong by showing them the truth was always a delight.

They never suspected that treachery would hide behind a smiling face. The young woman who came to them in the spring had been so earnest, so enthusiastic about learning that neither of them had reason to doubt her intentions.

The two women had agreed that she reminded them so much of themselves when they were younger. She kept her distance from them, reading and studying on her own, but they were sure that she would open up to them eventually, showing an interest in more than the books they kept.

Kira reasoned that the girl was nervous, still half believing the vicious rumors. They never suspected how deeply to heart she had taken those stories until they woke up from the bed they shared to the feeling that something was wrong.

Samara went down to the tower’s entrance to see if someone had managed to slip past her defenses and was attempting to get in uninvited while Kira went upstairs to check on the girl and the library, sure that she would be there.

Samara found the door open and all her wards disabled, the gardens silent, a heard of rosedeer laying withered to ash.

Terrified that she had left Kira alone with an intruder Samara rushed back inside. As she climbed the tower stairs to the library the acrid scent of smoke reached her, causing her to break into a run. The tower itself was stone and would be fine, but the books, two lifetimes of work, were in danger.

The sounds of the fire soon could be heard and over them Kira’s cries for help.

It made no sense. Why hadn’t Kira put it out herself, after all she was the one who could call on flame after all, granting it the semblance of a tame pet.

When Samara made it to the library the answer soon became dreadfully apparent.

The fire was one of magic, wild and hostile, fighting Kira’s every attempt to drive it back or subdue it. It leapt from book to book, crackling and hissing like a living thing, occasionally taking the form of a great, sleek martin as books flew apart into tatters of black smoke in its phantasmal jaws. It was nothing like the little birds and playful salamanders that Kira would occasionally coax from the flames, the marten hissed and spat sparks any time either of the woman got too close.

Determined to salvage what they could the Samara and Kira ran back into the library again and again, carrying out armfuls of books and scrolls. Anything they could save would be a starting point for rebuilding. It would be harder this time, but together they could do it.

Anytime the flame martin drew too close Kira would force its claws away with a pinpoint gust of wind that would send it tumbling away to find something easier to burn, or Samara would use a word of power to make it retreat. The martin was too fast for any of the words to hit it full on and destroy it, but puffs of smoke flashes of blue flame would peel off when the magic grazed it.

Once the books were safe they would worry about what had happened and why, but until every tome that could be saved was there was no time for any other concerns, like where the girl was and if she was safe.

The fire itself would have to be starved, or, once enough of the books that could be saved were removed, more drastic means could be used to subdue it. Samara had learned, but never used, words of life and death in her studies and had always wondered.

Back and forth they went as the fire grew worse. Black smoke blinding them, the roar of flames making it impossible for them to communicate when they again ran into the library. Over all the noise Samara never heard the shelves along the far wall collapse, though she felt the rush of heat and ash wash over her as the flames surged forward. Blinded by smoke, she kept going, heedless of her own safety.

She didn’t even know how she made it out the final time, just that she woke up with one of the rosedeer standing over her, the buds of one of its antlers wilted, the vines on that side of its body pale and brittle. Whatever had killed the others, it had managed to survive and it had found her to stand guard.

It was late morning and, other than the rosedeer, she was alone.

In a daze she rose to her feet and went inside the tower. Dread and frequent coughing fits slowed her.

Where was Kira?

Back inside, seeing what damage had been done was what she tried to tell herself, but that rang hollow. Kira would never have left her outside alone with only a rose deer for company.

Eyes watering from lingering smoke Samara looked up.

The sky was empty.

Kira’s kites had not taken to the air that morning.

Climbing the stairs to the library was such an impossibly long journey that Samara had to stop and rest several times. The exhaustion was so much deeper than mere physical pain. She knew what she would find, ruins and ash. Overnight the fire had eaten itself to death, as was the nature of such spiteful creatures.

The girl was gone. Samara had no doubt of that, just as she was sure that the girl had been the cause of it all.

There would be no more visitors after this. Rebuilding would take a long time and even then they needed a better way of protecting themselves.

Wisps of smoke rose when her passage disturbed some bit of debris that was hot enough to have smoldered through the night.

There, near the far wall, crumpled and balled up against the heat was something so small and pathetic that it could not possibly have once been a woman.

A body, even a dead one, was supposed to have weight to it, a certain gravity that spoke of a lifetime of memories.

Kira had always said that she wanted a sky burial, something she’d read about in one of their books so long ago. Forever was a long time to spend away from the sky and light, she’d said, back when that forever had seemed impossibly far away.

Samara brought the body to the garden and left it there, pushing it from her thoughts.

It was just a body, not Kira. There had been nothing of her in that husk, crumbling and near weightless.

She was alone, but it didn’t feel like Kira was gone, there was no proof of it. The body wasn’t real to her.

This was not the first time that they had been apart so Samara was not at a loss for what to do.

Samara swept the ash from the library, scoured the stones as best as she was able to remove the soot, though there were some places that she was unable to reach and in the cracks of many of the stones faint lines of black remained. Scars from what the building had endured, but it had endured and so would she.

Samara sowed the seeds for more rosedeer so that the heard could be rebuilt.

She found spare shelves in other rooms, or built them herself when there were none to be found that suited her needs.

She kept the garden full of sound and saw to it that Kira’s kites rose.

That way Kira would see them when she returned. Those kites would guide Kira back to her.

Samara had no clue when she started thinking that way, but it didn’t feel strange.

There had been times when one of them had needed to go off alone on some errand, visit family or complete some task that wasn’t worth pulling the other away for.

This felt like one of those times.

Summer blazed into a brilliant autumn and Samara avoided looking outside until the colors faded into winter.

Wind and snow kept her inside for much of the time until spring and when she went to the garden to look at the body the same way she might look at an unusual rock or a particularly fascinating, but not especially lovely flower she saw that the bones had been scattered.

Leaving them like that, at the mercy of animal and elements didn’t feel right, but burying them wasn’t an option either.

In the end she emptied out a fragrant cedar chest that she thought might be large enough, lined it with soft blankets and furs, gathered the bones and laid them in there.

The chest, which would never have been big enough for a body was far too large for the bones. They rested in the bottom, lonely and forlorn.

She left it open because it wasn’t a coffin, just something temporary. She wasn’t sure what she was waiting for, maybe for Kira to get back and tell her what to do with them. Kira had always known what to do, what to say.

Flowers bloomed, the rosedeer grew, large and more fearsome than she remembered them.

Perhaps she had been lax in pruning this crop, for their antlers came in earlier and more abundant, the thorns in the twining vines that served as their heads far longer, more akin to the fangs of a wolf than anything befitting a deer.

They were friendly and loyal though, protecting her until Kira returned.

She watched them in the evening, waiting for them to lift their heads and move as one to travel down the mountain. When they returned they would be guiding Kira back to her.

But that never happened and Samara soon took a more proactive approach.

Divination rituals allowed her to trace the path Kira traveled, providing fleeting glimpses in dreams. She was happy and waiting according to the signs, safe from harm, but coming no closer to home.

Or, when other signs were read, she was still home and so near.

There might have been a reason for certain means of divination being held in ill regard, for they opened the door to other paths, strange and wild paths and there were things that crept in from those uncharted places.

Samara had read of certain magics, the same basic principles had been used to create the rosedeer and required only slight modification to do so much more.

One morning she removed the bones from the chest and gently cleaned them, anointing them in fragrant oils so that they glistened like polished shell. With that done they were actually quite lovely, which made it feel less wrong to place them out on a table, on display for all to see.

Of course it was just her, there was no one else around to see the bones and wonder, so perhaps that was what made it easier.

Carefully she assembled them, stringing them together on bits of ribbon on which she had written magic and kind memories to make them hold stronger. The joints were wired together with gold and silver strands in intricate patterns, mimicking the growth of a rosedeer’s vines. Damaged bones were mended similarly and the ones that were missing were replaced with carefully grown and oiled bits of wood, perfectly identical to the bones they replaced, save for the color.

More gold wire held two carefully polished agates in the eye sockets of the skull. The ritual was very specific about the stones, the phase of the moon during which they had to be placed, and the words that needed to be said during the process. None of them were words of power, the process hardly felt like working magic at all, at least no magic that Samara had ever known.

She spent hours inscribing letters in a language she didn’t know on a flattened silver coin to put in the skull’s mouth.

More words and runes had to be carved into the bones of the ribs in intricate, spiraling patterns. Oils and waxes protected the bones and inscriptions, securing them.

In the flickering candlelight the bones shone like polished pearl, the skeleton slowly becoming lost in the art that it was being transformed into.

It was a beautiful creation, as lovely as anything either of them had crafted or grown and when Kira returned she would surely be pleased by what Samara had done, the lengths to which she had gone.

The ritual grew increasingly complex as Samara brought in aspects of other spells, determined to make things work just so and her efforts at divination showed that she was doing right. Kira was slowly returning to her, closer and closer each night.

So she waited, her work keeping her occupied until one day, as she was brushing red and blue pigment into the carved wood in the place of missing finger bones, those bones closed around her hand.

There was terror, only for a moment though.

Kira would never allow any harm to befall her.

Carefully she helped Kira stand, dressed her in her favorite robes and guided her through the tower, Samara showing off all she had accomplished while waiting for her return. The gardens had grown well, full of sound as the wind blew through them, though the sound was off in some subtle way, the song of the wind low and mournful, the chimes rattling like dried bones.

The library had been cleaned out, new shelves were in place, already holding what they’d managed to save of their collection, but the smell of smoke lingered, if only in her imagination. Many of the shelves were still empty, but they would have the chance to refill them as they had the first time, finding secrets together.

Agate eyes shone as Kira wordlessly took it all in, listening intently as Samara then went on to describe in detail the spell she had worked to bring her back.

She never raised a hand to interrupt, never spoke a word, so still that she might not have been there at all, yet she stood, listening and, Samara was done, she went to walk the gardens on her own, as she often did upon returning from a solitary trip.

The only sound she made was the rustle of her robes in the wind and the soft clicking of bone and wood against the stones of the garden path.

Kira sat in silence over the meal Samara made to celebrate her return and when Samara went to bed, exhausted from the reunion and what she had accomplished, she slept alone.

All night Kira walked the halls of the tower, up and down the stairs, reacquainting herself with it all, or so Samara imagined. She had been gone long and far after all.

In the morning Samara found her in the garden with the rosedeer and felt relief.

This was as it should be, Kira and the deer, even if the deer had grown wild and strange and Kira remained unnervingly silent.

That morning the kites took to the air, their flames hot and blue, their movements juddering and sharp.

Perhaps they were out of practice, perhaps Kira had some difficulty casting the spell with fingers of wood and wire.

In time Samara grew used to Kira’s return and fell into the same routine she had since her departure. There would be no more guests allowed to stay in the tower they agreed, no visits to the village below unless necessary, and when the time came for them to set out and rebuild their collection it would be done in secrecy.

All was well now, Samara told herself, for Kira wouldn’t, or couldn’t. She never spoke anymore save for when she whispered in tongues that were unknown to Samara. Words of comfort and reassurance, she told herself, for when Kira spoke she would rest a comforting hand on her shoulder, agate eyes unreadable.

Winter passed, spring came and the rosedeer bloomed.

There were more of them now, though Samara hadn’t sewn any seeds, their vines thicker, their thorns sharper and glistening silver in the moonlight when they moved silently through the gardens.

The gardens themselves were full of sound, shrill whistles and clattering, but no birdsong.

Samara had watched as the flock of kites, their paper and cloth skins so dense with writing that they appeared black, darted as one when a song bird flew past.

No little body fell to the ground, but the bird vanished.

When the kites settled down for the evening lines of red had been added to the black ink covering them.

Kira offered no explanation and Samara never sought one.

There were some things that simply had to be accepted, some paths, that once traveled, did not allow one to turn back.

They were together though and that was all that mattered.

Even if there were times when Samara imagined that the look she saw in those agates was one of profound sorrow and Kira’s whispers sounded almost like pleading.


End file.
